Link aggregation relates to combining various network connections in parallel to increase throughput, beyond what a single connection could sustain, and to provide redundancy between the links. Link aggregation including the Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) for Ethernet is defined in IEEE 802.1AX, IEEE 802.1aq, IEEE 802.3ad, as well as various proprietary solutions. IEEE 802.1AX-2008 and IEEE 802.1AX-2014 is entitled Link Aggregation, the contents of which are incorporated by reference. IEEE 802.1aq-2012 is entitled in Shortest Path Bridging, the contents of which are incorporated by reference. IEEE 802.3ad-2000 is entitled Link Aggregation, the contents of which are incorporated by reference. In conventional implementations of Link Aggregation, to set up protection, a user specifically specifies which port to add as a standby port in a LAG. Based on the user input, the configured port will either act as a standby port or an active port. The active ports would distribute traffic to the far end while the standby ports do not distribute traffic. This conventional implementation is complex; a user has to look for end-to-end connectivity of ports between two switches and configure standby and active ports accordingly at both the switches. This can lead to misconfigured active-standby ports at either end as the user might not be aware of active-standby configuration at the far end of the switch. The misconfiguration leads traffic loss at both ends of link aggregation because wrong active and stand-by ports could be connected to one another.